In addition to child abuse, the overall crime rate went up nearly 3 percent. Jacksonville saw a rash of domestic violence last year, including several child abuse killings and six murder-suicides that seemingly happened all over the city from the Deerwood area to the Northside.

"We definitely continue to see a high demand," Gail Patin, of the Hubbard House, said of the domestic abuse problem in Jacksonville. "It definitely doesn't abate. We oftentimes don't have enough beds for people, enough staff to meet the needs."

Patin said it's no wonder child abuse rates are up, because domestic homicides are up, too. And when there is domestic violence in the home where a child lives, the child normally is affected as well.

"For victims of domestic violence, which are particularly women and children, there's a high incidence of child abuse in homes where there is domestic violence," Patin said.

She said domestic violence is too complicated to pinpoint why it happens, but that now that Jacksonville knows how bad the issue is, raising awareness is the next step.

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